Thursday, March 06, 2008

White Women Feminism - There They Go Again

I got an email from the wonderful Elle PhD to alert me to the latest white women feminist shenanigans being reported at the Washington Post: To Women, So Much More Than Just a Candidate. Of course by women they mean the default women, middle to upper class white women, with some ageism thrown in for good measure since they show little respect for the decision making abilities of younger women too.

The first part of the article tells us that Clinton is not bringing in the crowds. Clinton's feminist contingent is not pleased that all of us vagina owners will not vote for the vagina candidate. Seriously, see if any of them mention any other reason why we should vote for Clinton. Some feminist from NOW says, "There are some people who promote Barack Obama because they want anybody but a woman. Would they like a white man instead of a black man? Of course. But they'll take a black man over a woman. I never thought, in 2008, that we'd still be dealing with this." Too bad the reporter didn't ask why Clinton wasn't running against Edwards instead of Obama then, I mean if all we want is a white penis candidate, we had our chance.

Then WaPo tells us: "As Wagner and other NOW executives toured Ohio last week, they repeated a resounding message: Clinton has been mistreated by an opponent who subtly demeans her, by a mainstream media that ridicules her, by voters too threatened to vote for a confident woman, by young women who no longer feel the urgency of the women's movement, by African American women for whom race is more important than gender." My head hurts. I'll let bark, bugs, leaves, and lizards handle this... and one of those...er...ingrates wants to put a bit of a exclamation point on what she finds important.

I gotta agree with her. I guess I'm an ingrate too. Some dude making a wisecrack for you to get in the kitchen, or worse, another dude pulling out a chair for you, damn, life is so hard! "...they just as often ended up commiserating about how sexism -- "the worst of the 'isms,' " they said here -- continues to thrive." Those middle to upper class, middle aged to elderly, white women have it worse than anyone else in the world. I'm just weeping for their hardships.

And you just gotta love their blatant racist, Moresky said. "I think a lot of women are really in shock about it, and they're going to feel gypped if she loses. Barack will still be another man in charge."

Did anyone else laugh out loud when they read this part? "Wagner said she never expected gender to become a determinant in this election." I don't think they are campaigning on much else lately.

"During the NOW tour across Ohio, the makeup of each audience was almost exclusively white, middle-age women, many of whom had joined the organization in the late 1960s or 1970s." People vote for who they think can best represent them. I understand perfectly well why this demographic is excited for Hillary Clinton, is showing up at her rallies, and is voting for her. But for some of us having a vagina isn't enough, because she will be voting for white, middle aged, middle class interests. Not to mention corporate lobbyist interests, and starting wars to prove she's as tough as the guys, which I hear is her excuse for her Iraq War vote. She would have to...lemme see...how about tell us what she is going to do for young people, to earn their votes; tell us what she plans to do for WOC, to earn our votes; you know, make us believe she gives a shit about us instead of taking us for granted and acting like she is entitled to be President because she is Bill Clinton's wife...and is a WOMAN, did you catch that? She's a WOMAN! It's the bestest reason in he whole wide world to vote for a candidate.

Clinton’s relentlessly negative campaign of the last week seems to have worked. For now. But it looks like Obama’s campaign is ready to answer back. David Axelrod, Obama’s campaign manager explains:

“We have not hesitated to draw distinctions between the candidates,” he said, ”and we’ll continue to do that. If Sen. Clinton wants to take the debate to various places, we’ll join that debate. We’ll do it on our terms and in our own way, but if she wants to make issues like ethics and disclosure and lawfirms and real estate deals and all that stuff issues, as I’ve said before I don’t know why they’d want to go there, but I guess that’s where they’ll take the race.”

But is Obama willing to go there?

“We’re willing to draw distinctions that are honest and legitimate,” Axelrod said before raising the issue of Clinton’s tax returns and the records from the Clinton library.

“I have a lifetime of experience I will bring to the White House. I know Senator McCain has a lifetime of experience he will bring to the White House. And Senator Obama has a speech he made in 2002.”

This is so utterly and completely self-destructive, short-minded and cynical. You don’t do this sort of thing in a primary.

If Hillary wants to compare her record to Obama’s, then fine. But to flat out say that the Republican nominee is more prepared than the overwhelming favorite to win the Democratic nomination is just astounding in its selfishness.

The message here? Screw the Democratic party, screw the election in November, if Hillary can’t be president, then no Democrat should be able to.

In a live CNN interview just now, Sen. Clinton repeated, twice, the “Sen. McCain has a lifetime of experience, I have a lifetime of experience, Sen. Obama has one speech in 2002″ line. By what logic, exactly, does a member of the Democratic party include the “Sen. McCain has a lifetime of experience” part of that sentence?

....oppression olympics doesn't work when you include a slur about the 'side' you're claiming no longer passes without comment.

As if there are only TWO sides.

I think she's trying to imply that she's the only one who can compete against McCain so we should vote for her, but honestly that's a really short sighted argument to make.

Besides, Obama has a lifetime of experience, too. It's just a slightly shorter lifetime. I'm seriously not seeing the issue, there. In terms of elected office, he has more experience than Clinton anyway.

The reason why all these white middle aged "feminist" women love Hillary is because she is them and they are her. A white woman who thinks equality means getting exactly what white men have and screw everyone else, a white woman who has used her relationship with a lying, philandering white man to prop herself into a position of greater influence. What gets me is this sentiment that Obama needs to "wait his turn". That kind of entitlement is mind boggling. No one has any moral claim to the presidency and there is no hierarchy that determines who is eligible for the job. Hilary Clinton's attitude reflects perfectly that of her supporters. How dare this black man take what is rightfully theirs? Nothing but his subservience and destruction would satiate them.

As a middle aged white woman, I hate being told I support someone I don't by the media. I voted for Obama in Virginia as did my 84 year old mother and my 30 something sister-in-law. As did my father and brother. I also hate the media saying Clinton is the first woman candidate for president. I am old enough to remember Shirley Chisholm but apparently even the media my age don't remember her. http://hymes.wordpress.com

Sigh. I'm not a Clinton supporter, but I can certainly see the rampant misogyny, and ageism, coming out of the Obama camp.

Color me cynical (comes with the NDN territory, neh, nidobaskwa?) but I want something more than flowery words from a candidate. Give me real policies, bore me with your wonkishness, Senators Obama and Clinton. I want to be convinced, not swept off my feet.

But I'm also really sad, as my five year old, Kezzie, told me the other day that she could never be president, "because she's not a boy." This from a child whose mother took her campaigning door-to-door on her hip as the first Indian woman from Portland to run for the Maine leg.

MB, There is definitely sexism/misogyny as well as ageism but it is coming from both sides. The second wavers supporting Clinton think that young women and WOC are stupid and just voting for "a rock star". If only these older white women would think before they speak once in awhile they wouldn't turn off possible constituencies. People are assuming that black women were always going to vote for Obama since that is how it played out, but when black women see how low they are thought of by the Clinton camp, why should they vote for her? As far as I can tell Obama did not have a lock on the black vote, but the racist shenanigans told them who definitely did not have their backs.

But yes, if my anger towards the second wavers translates as sexism and ageism then so be it.